A group of SPAR Poland retailers recently had the opportunity to attend a knowledge exchange trip to Ireland to visit SPAR stores in Dublin. The participants were the lucky winners of a series of internal competitions organised by SPAR Poland.

The agenda included visits to SPAR Ireland convenience stores and supermarkets, allowing Polish retailers to experience best practice retail standards in the Irish market. The participants also visited the National Kilcarbery Distribution Centre, supplier of all SPAR Ireland stores and winner of many awards in logistics, such as the 2018 Irish Logistics and Transport Award. The store visits were led by Declan Ralphs from SPAR Ireland, who provided information on the format strategy in the local market.

In addition to all the new learnings, the Dublin tour was a great opportunity for SPAR Poland retailers to get to know each other better and exchange knowledge with each other. In particular, the group showed great interest in the deli offering and various coffee concepts in SPAR Ireland stores.

As a part of the Better Together strategy of exchanging experiences and intensifying the cooperation with SPAR retailers by organising knowledge exchanges for SPAR retailers, SPAR Poland will take another group of store owners to China in September 2018, allowing them to see the excellent SPAR stores in the province of Guangdong.

Source: SPAR Poland

About SPAR Poland

Poland became a member of SPAR in 1995 and the first SPAR store opened in 1996. Following a series of changes to the ownership of the company, SPAR Poland now has a strong retail management team in place, catering for the needs of its independent retailers and developing new concepts through its corporate stores. Expansion and growth has been strong over the years and there are now more than 250 SPAR stores open in Poland, serving close to three million customers each month. SPAR Poland’s Head Office is located in Rzeszów, in the southeast of the country.